Black Eyes
by ladyoftheknightley
Summary: After the war, Draco Malfoy is keen to escape the country and especially all the staring he gets, no matter where he goes. A chance meeting in a bar in Romania, however, shows him that not everyone who gazes at him does so with bad intentions... For MissingMommy as part of the Gift-Giving Extravaganza


**A/N: **For the wonderful Sam (**MissingMommy**) as part of the Gift Giving Extravaganza, who asked for Charlie/Draco. I am so, so sorry it has taken this long to write this! I've never actually written this pairing before, so I hope it's okay, but it was nice to do something a bit different for once and I hope you enjoy it :)

**Disclaimer: **No, nay, never etc.

* * *

Two months after he finishes his seventh year of school, Draco Malfoy leaves the country and decides he's never coming back.

Technically, it's his eighth year; like many of the so-called Heroes of Hogwarts, he goes back and repeats his final year of school. Unlike the rest of them, however, he doesn't _choose_ to go back to school—it's not like he has many happy memories at the place—but is rather forced into it. Potter speaks at his trial and ensures he isn't punished too severely for what he did during the war, for which, he supposes, he should be grateful, but somehow he can't quite manage that. The Wizengamot decides not to send him to Azkaban, but instead insists he must return to school for the year as a sort of probation.

It's so they can keep an eye on him, he assumes—they want to be sure he really _does_ regret what he did, that he really _is_ trying to change his ways—but he often wonders if they realised it's more of a prison sentence than sending him to Azkaban itself would have been. He has no friends there: the few children of Death Eaters who have returned want nothing to do with the traitorous Malfoys, and the other students are not quick to forgive and forget his sins of the previous year. Having no friends doesn't bother him though—it at least means he's left alone for the majority of the time, which is what he wants.

Or at least, in theory it means he should be left alone.

In actual fact, whilst no one actually _talks_ to him, every single student at Hogwarts (or so it feels) stares at him constantly. No matter what he's doing—eating, studying, taking notes, walking through the corridors—he always feels the eyes of another student on him, and it's not paranoia. They really are gawping at him.

Some gaze at him in fear, others in anger or contempt or hatred. A few look at him in pity, still others in surprise or even outrage that he's come back. The constant staring leaves him feeling trapped, constantly, and towards the end he becomes so sick of it he seriously contemplates just packing up and leaving. He tells his parents this, over the Easter holidays, and his mother forbids it: "You'll be sent straight to Azkaban, and however hard you're finding Hogwarts, remember that that will be twenty times worse!"

He snaps back that he'd almost rather that be the case, but even he realises he's gone too far when he sees the hurt and disappointment on his mother's face. Guilt stops him from giving up school—guilt, and the thought that if he can just survive these last few weeks (which he does, amazingly) he'll finally be rid of all the staring.

He isn't.

Every time he leaves Malfoy Manor, to go to the Ministry, or to Diagon Alley or Knockturn Alley, or Hogsmeade, or any of the other magical places, he's met with hostile glares and worse. At school, the abuse he was subjected to was limited to the odd hissed insult, and after one incident when a Ravenclaw boy in the year below tried to beat him up in the Charms corridor and was placed in a month's detention, no one bothered him outright again. Out in the real world this is not the case.

He stops leaving the house—it's the only way to guarantee his safety short of altering his appearance whenever he leaves the house. His human transfiguration skills are poor and the results last an hour at best. And somehow, people can always tell it's him beneath the disguises. But he quickly gets sick of never leaving Malfoy Manor; it's a fairly Spartan place these days, as the Ministry confiscated many of their belongings to check them for evidence of Dark Magic, and they're only returning at a rate of about one every two or three months. And who would want to stay in the place where so much torture and killing had taken place?

It is the discovery that the fund his Great-Grandfather had set up for him just before he died is still in his existence that makes up his mind in the end. He's had half-formed plans of fleeing for Europe for a while now, but when he—quite by accident—finds out that Great-Grandfather Malfoy had left 500 Galleons in trust to Draco when he was just three months old, to be used for the traditional tour of the wizarding world, he decides that this is his opportunity for escape, and by Merlin is he going to take it.

The money is to be used for travelling only—Great-Grandfather was quite specific about that—and though he won't be taking the (now rather old fashioned) traditional tour of the wizarding world, he doesn't think that his Great-Grandfather would have too many objections to him heading to the continent for as long as the money holds out.

He packs his things up and manages to leave remarkably quickly; though, as terms of his probation, he's not supposed to leave the country without strict permission from the Department of International Magical Co-Operation, the Malfoys must still have one friend in there somewhere as his application for a visa is rushed through within a week. His mother cries as she accompanies him to the Portkey Office—a rare sight, and one that shocks him, slightly—but despite her tears, he can't bring himself to mean it when he promises that yes, he'll be back soon, he'll probably just be away for the summer, hardly long enough for her to miss him at all...

When he arrives in Europe things start looking up immediately. For one thing, the weather is so much better than it is in the UK: sunshine and beautiful blue skies all day, and deliciously warm nights. He spends most of July and August on the beaches of France, Portugal, Spain and Italy and the nights in bars, watching people rather than having them watch _him_, for the first time in ages.

He doesn't realise how wonderful that is until he goes back home for a few days in early September for his father's birthday, and feels the stares—and worse—from what feels like the entirety of wizarding Britain every time he leaves his parents' house. After three days, he packs up again and leaves.

This time, he decides, he probably won't come back.

* * *

Late in November, he's sat in a bar in Romania, nursing a Firewhiskey, when he feels someone staring at him. It takes him a moment to place the feeling—a sort of prickling sensation on the back of his neck, combined with a sense of things being not quite right somehow—but he soon does, with a sinking sensation in his stomach. _Someone_ out here has recognised him, Salazar only knows how... Turning, he easily spies who it is who is staring at him so hard—the red-haired man in the corner can _only_ be a Weasley.

He sort of resembles those dreadful twins, but his hair is longer, and his arms are covered in burn scars and tattoos. He looks to be a few years older than Draco—maybe late twenties—though the war could have aged him, he supposes. He doesn't recognise him, but he knew that there had been several Weasleys—more children than they can afford, his father always said—and it's very possible that he'd already finished with school by the time Draco had entered Hogwarts. The man sees him staring back, but instead of looking away, he gets up, crosses the bar, and walks over to him.

Draco gulps. His wandwork is shoddier than it should be from lack of practise—he curses his past self for becoming so complacent since he's been out here—and the man has the most muscular arms he's seen for a while. He could take him out with one hand tied behind his back, and Draco doesn't have to think hard about what motivation the man might have for doing that. He's a Weasley, a family that were anathema to the Malfoys even before the war had begun. After one of those twins had been killed...Draco doesn't need to think hard about how that hatred might have increased.

Still, he tries not to show that. He still has his pride, if nothing else.

The Weasley says the Romanian word for hello, but Draco replies in English. He doesn't want to engage him in conversation, but if it means being able to buy himself some time whilst he plots an escape, he'll take it. "You're a Black, aren't you?" says the Weasley.

Draco blinks in surprise. If he'd been given a hundred years to imagine things a Weasley might say to him, he would never have come up with that. "In a manner of speaking," he drawls. Surely, _surely_, the man must recognise him? They've just fought in a war together—on _opposing sides_. "You're a Weasley," he adds.

The man nods. "Charlie," he says brusquely. He's staring at Draco with an intensity that he's become used to, but even though their faces are now mere inches apart, Draco can't read his expression. It's something he's become used to—mostly so he can tell whether a starer is going to attack him or not—and he's become very good at it. But this Weasley—Charlie—has an inscrutable look about him. This unnerves him slightly, but, despite that, he doesn't think he's about to get hexed or punched.

Something clicks. "You don't know who I am, do you?"

"You've just said you're a Black," Weasley responds.

"Half, from my mother," says Draco. He can practically see the wheels turning in the man's eyes.

"You're Draco Malfoy, aren't you?" he breathes.

"Didn't you know? I thought I was all over that rag they call a newspaper last year," Draco says.

"I preferred not to read about the trials of the people who killed my brother," Weasley says, quite calmly.

"I'll be going, then," Draco says, taking this as his cue to leave, before things turn nasty.

Before he can properly get to his feet, the man reaches out and places on hand on his arm, effectively holding him in place. "Stay," he says, and its somewhere between a plea and a command. Draco glances down at the hand, strangely—pleasantly—warm on his arm and cocks an eyebrow, ready to make some biting retort, but when he glances up at Charlie, anything he might have to say dies in his throat.

He's staring at him, and that should bother him, given all the staring he's had to put up with until now, but it feels like someone is actually _looking_ at him for the first time in forever. And he doesn't want it to stop.

That thought hits him out of nowhere, and he literally jerks in surprise. His sudden movement seems to break Weasley out of the almost trancelike state he'd fallen into, and he mutters an apology. "I didn't think I'd ever get to see those eyes again," he adds, as though this is enough explanation. "Once she was gone, I mean..."

Draco swallows. It's obvious that Weasley is, if not drunk, at least mildly tipsy. He has a lost, faraway look in his eyes, and he's sure that probably most of what he's saying is just the Firewhiskey talking. Despite this, and against his better judgement, he's intriguied. Weasley identified him as a Black _before_ he identified him as a Malfoy. He's far too young to have known of his mother or her sisters before they were married; Regulus was killed years ago and Sirius, the blood-traitor, was in Azkaban for most of his life. He can't think of a single reason for Weasley to have known the Black family, and he wishes he knew who the hell he was talking about...

Slowly and deliberately, Weasley leans in towards him. For a second, he thinks he's going to kiss him (and the idea doesn't bother him like it maybe should), but instead Weasley reaches forward and oh-so-tenderly strokes his thumb across Draco's eyebrow. His eyes close automatically, and Weasley's fingers brush his eyelids. His burnt and blistered fingers should by all rights have felt rough against his own delicate skin, but they felt inexplicably smooth and gentle. An involuntary sigh escapes him and then—so lightly and quickly he could swear it doesn't _actually_ happen, and that he's just imagining things—he feels the other man's lips against his own.

Draco's eyes fly open immediately, and Weasley is already on his feet, a dull flush on cheeks. "Sorry," he mutters. "Shouldn't have done that. I just—it's _her_ eyes I was thinking of, and—_shit_."

He leaves the bar, Draco scrambling after him, but something—maybe the alcohol he was drinking earlier, maybe something more—has dulled his senses and he's too slow to catch him once he apparates away. Draco stands outside in the frosty air for a long time, breathing heavily. He feels as though he's just run a marathon, when he barely jogged the few feet from the bar to the door, and he just _can't_ get the feel of Weasley's fingertips on his face out of his mind.

Snarling slightly under his breath, he apparates back to the hotel room he's renting on the outskirts of town. Despite its extremely comfortable furnishings, he can't sleep all night for the thoughts of Weasley in his head. No, Charlie, he mentally corrects himself, some time around two in the morning. Calling him Weasley reminds himself too much of Potter's little minion. Charlie's different to him; and he's different too to Weaslette, those dreadful twins and the older one with a stick up his arse who was Head Boy in Draco's third year of school. He has an inexplicable need to see him again, but he realises that this will be impossible—he doesn't know a thing about him. He finds himself wishing he'd listened more to snatches of conversation he'd overheard between Weasley and Potter at school, then almost laughs at the ridiculousness of the situation.

He doesn't understand where this need to see Charlie again is coming from.

Shortly before dawn, he finally remembers something of use: the issue with that damned dragon in his first year happened because he'd overheard Potter and Weasley talking about sending Hagrid's pet to Charlie in Romania. Charlie must work at the Dragon Reserve not far from here—he could visit in the morning, and—

And ask him what he meant about recognising his eyes. Yes. That's _definitely_ the only thing he wants to do with Charlie Weasley...

* * *

For once, fate is on Draco's side. He finds the Reserve quickly, and there's an American sounding witch behind the welcome desk at the visitor's centre. She doesn't recognise Draco, and so doesn't do the staring thing. She's polite when she speaks to him too, which, even after spending time on the continent, is still something he is surprised by.

"Could you tell me if Charlie Weasley works here?" he asks.

"Charlie?" says the woman. "Well, technically no. He used to, you see, but he packed up yesterday."

"Packed up?!" Draco asks.

"He's takin' a month's vacation before Christmas, then leaving us for Holyhead in January," she smiles. "He transferred over there to be closer to his family, I think, he's from England, you know? But if you're needin' to speak with him on a business related enquiry, I can get you the address of the Reserve there if you just hold on a mo—"

"No!" Draco exclaims, blushing violently. "I mean, no. That won't be necessary," he says more calmly, with a curt nod at the woman. "Goodbye."

She blinks in surprise as he all but runs out of there, not slowing until he's several hundred yards away from the reserve. He doesn't want anyone to come out and recognise him—if it ever got back to Weasley, or _anyone_ really, that he'd been asking about him...

But still...

He's been contemplating heading home for a while—he misses his mother rather more than he'd thought he might—but every time he gets too homesick, he simply remembered the staring, the _abuse_ he'd faced in his home country. But now he has an excuse to go back, in the shape of Charlie Weasley.

Because he needs to find out who he was on about, when he said that Draco had 'her eyes'. Even thinking about that makes him inexplicably jealous of this mysterious _her_, whoever she is...

Draco snorts.

The only person he could never lie to was himself. He has one reason for wanting to go back to the UK, and that's Charlie Weasley himself, and not some mysterious woman. He squares his shoulders and heads back to his hotel room.

He wonders, as he packs up, how hard it would be to find a flat to rent in Wales.


End file.
